by Pippa Grant
I should follow, but I don’t want to see him.
I want—
Dammit.
I want sunshine.
I turn, and everyone pretends they weren’t staring. So I lift my cell phone, which isn’t ringing, and mutter, “Gotta take this.”
And then, like a chickenshit, I dash into the nearest closet.
Fuck on a breadstick. I’m dialing Henri.
“Luca! Hey. I was thinking about—”
“My father showed up.”
“Oh.” It’s a quiet oh that makes me think she probably did the research I told her not to do, and if I’ve learned anything at all about Henri in the last few weeks, it’s that she can find things no other mortal being on earth can find when she sets out on a research mission.
“He played pro hockey for two years. That’s where he met my mom. But his contract didn’t get renewed, and then I was born, and then he left us both for my kindergarten teacher a few years later. My mom revenge-dated one of my classmates’ dads for two years, I got attached, they broke up, and love sucks, and I have a shithole of a house because I buy and renovate shitholes everywhere I go, then I rent them out when I’m traded so that if my career ends tomorrow, I still have cash flow, and I still have money in the bank, and I haven’t gotten used to a Lamborghini lifestyle on a ramen noodle budget. I’m not going to be him. I am not going to be him.”
Jesus on manicotti, I’m sweating.
I’m sweating like I ran a marathon in the Sahara, and I don’t sweat. Not like this.
I live without central air when I’m home. My body’s conditioned for heat.
“Luca—”
“I’ve never had a team sign me for longer than a year at a time. I could lose this. All of this. Any minute. It could go poof. And it’s not the money, Henri. It’s not the endorsements. It’s the guys. The team. They’re family. They’re family.”
“And that’s why you’ll never be him.”
I blow out a slow breath and drop my head to a shelf lined with Gatorades. “But I still let his actions guide mine.”
My heart’s twisted in a knot and my gut doesn’t feel all that great either. Since I left home and landed at my first minor league ballpark, I’ve watched my teammates around me fall in love. Some get married. Some break up. Some get divorced. Some have kids.
I’m not built for that.
That part of me is broken. It has been since I was six years old.
“Do you want to get married?”
I rear back and stare at the phone, but the bone-deep horror isn’t there like it should be.
“Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, not to me!” Henri calls. “Don’t hang up! I wasn’t proposing! It was a metaphorical question! I meant would you want to marry someone someday if your parents hadn’t screwed up love for you!”
“Jesus on a meatball.”
“Luca, there’s nothing wrong with you. Your toes are shaped kinda weird, and you make those loud noises when you drink, but only sometimes, and you know you’re good-looking, which is never a good thing, but other than that, you’re a normal, everyday guy with the same hopes and dreams and fears as anyone else. They’re custom-tailored hopes and dreams and fears. That’s what makes all of us special. You can find love. You just—gah. Sorry. Sorry. I know. Not part of the deal.”
“Henri?”
“Yes?”
She’s cringing. I can hear her cringing. And I hate that. Is she cringing because I’ve been a dick, or is she cringing because everyone’s always been a dick?
Dammit. I need to stop being a dick to her.
I do.
“Thank you for listening.”
There’s another one of those beats of silence where I don’t know if she’s marveling over the fact that I used my manners, or wondering if I’m silently adding “and please stop talking.”
Again.
Probably both.
“I know I’m a disaster with my own love life, and it’s not like I have a degree in psychology or anything that cool, but I do know a little bit about people. It’s hard not to after reading so many books and writing vampires for this many years. Not that vampires are real. But they’re based on people. And people usually simply want to be loved, but have a few hang-ups because you can’t live a life and not get a hang-up or two. Don’t give up if you want it, Luca. But you don’t have to want it. Some people don’t.”
Thirty seconds, and she has me re-evaluating half the things I’ve believed almost my entire life.
“Oh, wow, I’m talking too much again.” She forces a laugh. “You have a ball game to get ready for. Do I need to call Nonna and make sure she takes care of things?”
“No. She’s got it. I could handle it. But she’s got it.”
“Good, because I don’t know that I have any talents that could terrify a person the way your nonna’s Eye can. Also, every time you’re up to bat today, you should picture the ball as Glow’s butt.”
I rub my chest, right where there’s some weird swelling going on that my coaches would probably want to know about if it were caused by anything that might interfere with my game.
But this isn’t a physical problem.
It’s an emotional problem.
And the weirdest part is, it doesn’t feel like it’s a problem. “You’re a good friend, Henri.”
“I know.”
A surprised laugh wells out of my chest.
“Go on. Go win a few ballgames, okay? Everything else can wait. And I need to call my sister back—”
“Ugh.”
She laughs. “That’s no way to win a ball game.”
“I was talking about your sister.”
“I know. I’m pretending you weren’t. Call me back if you need anything.”
I hate her sister, and I don’t even know her sister. All I know is that every time she talks to her sister, she gets off the phone looking like a lost puppy dog who was abandoned by some railroad tracks and had to make friends with the grass fairies who always talked crap about the puppy dog behind its back.
She hangs up, and the closet door wrenches open. “You jacking off in here?” Nonna asks.
I squeeze my eyes shut.
“Good. Get out here. You’re up. Torres! Get the pink unicorn! My grandson and I are going to Gel together while in matching costumes!” She looks me up and down. “I took care of the problem. I’d apologize for it being a problem in the first place, except then I wouldn’t have you, and I will never apologize for you. At least, not when you’re doing what I tell you to.” She winks. “When’re you shooting your next shampoo commercial?”
“November.”
“Good. You have time. Torres! Nix that! Grab the hair dye instead. We got some work to do.”
23
Henri
By the time I’m off the phone with Elsa, who wanted to tell me about her latest cravings and the state of her cervix at this point in her pregnancy and Titus’s new words and about their new rescue dog and about a fundraiser she’s organizing for a women’s shelter between batches of homemade bread that she’s donating to a bake sale supporting a save-the-turtles initiative, I’m exhausted on her behalf.
How does one person do that many things?
But I’m not too exhausted to worry about Luca.
He called me.
He called me because he needed a friend, when he could’ve picked any one of his teammates.
I want to call him back and check on him, but I know—I know—he doesn’t want me to. We’ve had our moment, and that’s it, and now he wants me to leave him alone.
Or possibly my newfound don’t fall in love radar says that I need space.
Space?
No. Forget space.
I need brownies.
But the oven is still broken—I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want to see my six different proposed plans for in here, especially with what he said about getting traded so often, because who wants to design a dream kitchen only to spend the next however many weeks and
months waiting for word that it’s time to give it all up?
Gah.
And I thought losing my house to Barry was bad. At least I knew it was a starter house. My second starter house—don’t ask about what happened with Winston Randolph, please—but still a starter house.
I give up on trying to get any more work done, and I text Marisol.
Two hours later, we’re camped out in her adorable kitchen while brownies bake, her drinking a gin and tonic, me drinking Dr Pepper out of matching mugs that declare us both to be crazypants, talking about our favorite episodes of both Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Stacey & Lacey: Twins on a Mission.
She and Emilio live in a cozy four-bedroom house in a middle-class section of Copper Valley. They, too, could live somewhere more upscale, but Marisol tells me she put her foot down when Emilio suggested they look somewhere more expensive. “I told him I was here for the man, not the money, but…four years later, here we are, and he still hasn’t proposed, and I don’t know what else to do to convince the man that I need a ring. I mean, not a ring-ring, but a formal commitment.”
“Maybe you should propose to him?”
“And maybe I’m meant to live in sin and be excommunicated from my family until my parents forgive me in the name of seeing their illegitimate grandchildren.”
“There’s goodness in being the one who screws up. It means the bar’s lower for what counts as right.” I clap a hand over my mouth and eyeball the Dr Pepper that I drink when I want alcohol. “Sorry. I don’t mean you’re a screw-up.”
She laughs. “We’re all screwed up in our own ways. And you’re not wrong.”
Mackenzie strolls in through the back door right after the brownies come out of the oven.
Actually, strolls isn’t right.
More like hefts.
She’s grunting and sweating and pulling three massive trash bags behind her.
Marisol leaps to help her. “Oooh, is this Meaty, Phase Seven?”
“I have no idea what you’re—oof—talking about.” Mackenzie pauses and pants against the countertop. “Also, can we maybe toss these in your basement for, I don’t know, twenty years or so? Don’t look inside. Then you’re not a hair tie.”
“A hair tie?” I’m so confused.
Marisol snorts in utter glee. “She means an accessory. But if she calls it a hair tie, we don’t know we’re helping her commit crimes against the mascots. Ohmygod. Mackenzie! You didn’t.”
Mackenzie shoos her away from peeking inside the bags. “Don’t look!”
“Honey, I’ll do you one better than storing those in the basement. We’ll light us a bonfire tonight.”
“Toxic fumes!”
I manage to get a glimpse too, and I gasp. I don’t know if it’s horror or delight or somewhere in between, but I know that the Dr Pepper is giving me a caffeine buzz that’s distracting me from wondering what Luca’s doing and how he’s coping and if Nonna got rid of his father or if he’ll know his dad is in the stands at the game tonight.
Gah. Now I’m thinking about it all over again.
No. Nope.
Concentrate on the bag of stolen stuffed fireflies.
“Why would they make those?” I whisper as I point to the bag.
“Giveaways to fans. But justice has been done, and at the next home game, twenty-thousand fans will get stuffed Fiery the Dragons instead of these abominations. No one will have to pick anything less than the best.”
“I am so in love with you right now,” Marisol whispers.
Mackenzie grins. “I know. I’m a little in love with me too. Though my dads are pissed at how much space the other nineteen thousand of these puppies are taking up in their dressing room at the club…”
“Girl. You are goals.”
“I’m a fan doing what any fan would do. Probably. Oh! Did I tell you that my dads know someone who can set up a black market auction, and then we can donate all the proceeds to charity?”
“Like a charity to train baseball owners to not give bad mascot choices?”
“Yes.”
We all crack up, because we know she means a real charity.
At least, I think that’s the joke.
We stash the stuffed Glows, and then we dig into the noodle feast that Mackenzie brought from her dads’ lounge. “How’s Emilio doing with his dad on the road?” she asks Marisol.
“They’re bickering like always, but he’s loving it. Like, if they don’t argue over whose music is better, have they actually seen each other? What about Brooks? Is his dad all look at my new granddaughters, or has he paused to remember that he’s supposed to pretend he cares that he has a few sons who haven’t given him grandkids?”
“He’s pretty much all look at my new granddaughters, but since Brooks is lowkey hoping for six or seven baby girls himself, he’s cool with it.”
“Brooks wants kids? Like, right now?”
“He’s conflicted. He does have at least a decade’s worth of having sex to make up, which I am completely here for, but when he talks about the babies…” Her smile goes dreamy for a moment, then she blushes and shakes her head. “We’re still working on getting through this season and having the wedding and then not cursing ourselves or the team with anything first.”
“Aw, you two are adorable. Can Brooks maybe rub off on Emilio?”
I lunge across the table to hug Marisol, because I know that feeling.
I’m giving it up, but I know that feeling.
She squeezes me back. “Is Luca’s dad traveling with the team?”
“Ah,” I start, but Mackenzie coughs and shakes her head.
“No way. Management wouldn’t do that to him.”
I lift my brows at her.
She ruffles hers together. “You don’t know?”
Have you met Luca? doesn't seem like the brightest answer if I’m going to keep insisting we’re happily dating. “I know he doesn’t get along with his dad, but we don’t talk about serious things yet…”
She rolls her eyes. “You mean he’s pulling a man and refusing to talk to you about it whenever you bring it up, like it doesn’t color his entire world view?”
I nod. “Yes. That.”
Marisol cracks up in her drink and has to wipe her chin and nose, which I totally appreciate, since that’s usually me. “Men. I swear.”
I lean into Mackenzie. “So what do you know?”
She bites her lip, then leans in too. “You know he was engaged?”
I nod.
Marisol nods.
“He was playing for New York with Brooks that year. He found out on his wedding day that his fiancée had been paid to go on dates with him.”
“Oh, that’s bad,” Marisol whispers as my heart drops to my toes.
Lyle dated me because he wanted an in at my father’s bank. That metaphorical slap in the face when I found out—I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
And Luca, who was already sensitive to the dangers of falling in love after being abandoned by multiple father figures in his childhood, must’ve gotten punched in the heart with it.
Mackenzie’s frowning like she’s afraid of putting bad vibes out in the universe when the team is so close to the playoffs, but she still keeps talking. “He gave an interview about how love was for suckers, and his agent thought it looked bad, so…”
“His agent paid a woman to date him?”
“Yeah. Brooks said Luca found out hours before the wedding when his dad let it slip. Apparently the same guy was his dad’s agent back in the day. Mr. Rossi and Luca started reconnecting once Luca went pro and signed with the guy.”
Oh my god.
My heart demands that I open my chest and let it take wing to fly up to Boston and hug him. It’s one thing to know your dad’s a very busy man, like mine, keeping a bank running so people can borrow money for homes and cars and build their nest eggs, but it’s another to be treated like you’re worthless until you achieve the practically impossible and become an elite pro athlete, merely
to get smacked in the face with the idea that no one could love you unless they’re paid to?
“Nuh-uh.” Marisol leans back and shakes her head. “No parent is that heartless. Are you sure you’re not feeding us a story?”
Mackenzie goes pink. “Don’t underestimate my ability to do research when it comes to baseball players. I…might’ve found out way more than I should’ve about all of the Fireballs’ new players over the winter.”
Poor Luca.
But I can fix this. I can— “No.”
My two friends shoot me startled glances, and now I, too, am undoubtedly turning pink. “I mean, that’s not right.”
“I got my story wrong? Or you don’t want the gossip?”
“No! I’m sure you’re right, and I want all the gossip. Luca and I are still enjoying…you know…the easy benefits, so we haven’t exactly shared all the deep and meaningful stuff yet—though I know we will—but that’s so cruel. And wrong.”
“He fired his agent the same day. And he was mid-negotiation for exercising his contract option with New York, which is part of why he got traded. Everything stalled too long, and his new agent had higher aspirations. It’s worked out well, I’d say—the new guy’s the one who was like, ‘start growing your hair enough that we get a few good shots for me to sell to shampoo companies.’ Kinda ruthless, but also admirable, I guess?”
“Paid off,” Marisol mutters. “Emilio can’t even get endorsement deals for used car lots.”
“Emilio needs a new agent too. Oh! Game time! Where’s the popcorn? And I promised Brooks we’d do the wave together for good luck, and do you mind if I light a few candles? We’re so close. I need to smell fall. I need to smell fall and believe.”
Yesterday, I would’ve thrown my whole heart into helping Mackenzie with her superstitions.
Today, I feel wrong being here when I suspect Luca’s struggling in Boston.
And when the pre-game show starts on Marisol and Emilio’s television, and the camera pans to the entire Fireballs’ team with their hats off for the national anthem, we all gape.
“Their hair,” Marisol gasps.
“The dads did not do that. Ohmygod, this better not be bad luck.”